The detainees allegedly “acted together and methodically with the prime suspect in order to create and present fictitious contracts and deals… on a foreign country in order to transfer funds and launder money,” an Israeli police spokesperson said as cited by Reuters.

Tal Silberstein, a former consultant to the Austrian chancellor and former Israeli premier Ehud Barak, and David Granot, acting chairman of the Bezeq telecoms group, were also arrested as part of the raids.

Steinmetz, 60, has a net worth of $1.02 billion thanks to his real estate, engineering and mining empires, reports Forbes.

Both Steinmetz and Silberstein will be held in custody for four more days as authorities fear they might interfere with the investigation.

“The man has proved to us, with his capacities to interfere, that if he were to be released, he could take actions that would interfere with the investigation,” the officer in charge of the investigation Avshalom Ahrak testified in court, as cited by sued Soros for allegedly scuttling the iron ore deal with the Guinean government, claiming $10 billion in damages.

“Soros was motivated solely by malice, as there was no economic interest he had in Guinea,” BSGR alleged in the suit.

A spokesman for Soros described the claims as a “desperate PR stunt meant to deflect attention from BSGR’s mounting legal problems across multiple jurisdictions,” as cited by The Telegraph.

The place, identified as Aziz Istanbul restaurant in the city center, was “attacked by suspected jihadists,” AFP reported, citing a restaurant server.

Three of the perpetrators have been killed by security forces, Communications Minister Remi Dandjinou confirmed to state TV on Monday, as cited by Reuters. He did not elaborate on how many attackers were involved in the assault.

“They are confined to one part of the building they attacked. Security and elite forces are conducting an operation,” he said earlier.

Earlier Dandjinou confirmed that at least 17 people have been killed and eight others injured in attack in the capital, Ouagadougou, Burkina 24 reported him as saying.

AFP reported, citing an unnamed army officer, that the hostages were taken on both floors of a two-story building, with the restaurant located on the ground floor.

Fuzzy footage of nighttime streets with heavy gunfire being heard has surfaced on social media. Some pictures showed presumed survivors of the attack. A witness told Reuters that he saw customers running out of the restaurant, with security forces surrounding the area.

Meanwhile, Communications Minister Remi Dandjinousay said the authorities are not ruling out that the incident was a terrorist attack.

The central street where the Turkish restaurant is located has several luxury hotels favored by foreign visitors, including the nearby Hotel Bravia and the Splendid Hotel. The Splendid was the target of the January 15, 2016 terrorist attack, in which Al-Qaeda-affiliated militants cold-bloodedly shot or took hostage some 200 people. Some 176 hostages were released, over 50 people were injured and 30 died. The slain victims included citizens of 10 foreign countries, including Canada, Ukraine, France, Switzerland and the US.

Mali, which borders Burkina Faso, has been battling a jihadist insurgency in its northern and central regions for years. In June, jihadists stormed a luxury resort in Bamako, the country’s capital, taking dozens of hostages and killing five people.

Indian health authorities delivered on Monday (14/08) oxygen to a public hospital where 63 people have died of encephalitis in recent days, nearly half of them children, as it ran out of medical supplies because of unpaid bills, triggering public outrage.

The deaths of the children have again exposed India’s underfunded and poorly managed public health care despite Prime Minister Narendra Modi government’s vows to revamp the system.

Hundreds of people die each year in India of encephalitis, a mosquito-borne disease common during the monsoon season, and no medical official directly linked the recent deaths to a lack of oxygen.

But complaints that the hospital in the eastern city of Gorakhpur did not have enough supplies has stoked anger against the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, which governs Uttar Pradesh state.

“We now have adequate supplies of oxygen cylinders, there was a shortage last week… but I am not in a position to say whether they were the cause behind the deaths,” R.K. Sahai, a senior medical officer in the hospital, said.

Television images of parents emerging from the hospital carrying the bodies of infants and alleging they died because there they didn’t get oxygen have led to a firestorm of criticism of Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, a saffron-robed Hindu hardliner who took office earlier this year.

Bipin Singh said his 6-year-old daughter died on Thursday because of lack of oxygen and he had seen six other children die for the same reason.

“My daughter and other children were unable to breathe. We kept telling the nurses that they should call the doctors. The doctors said they have ordered for oxygen cylinders but we never saw them being used.”

Bahadur Nishad, who lost a 4-year-old son suffering from encephalitis, said he was ready to pay for the oxygen cylinders himself.

“They told me there was a shortage of cylinders,” he said and turned his wrath on chief minister Yogi Adityanath whose electoral constituency is Gorakhpur.

Other parents spoke of desperately trying to arrange basic materials such as cotton gauze, glucose injections and blood supplies as their children struggled for life in the wards.

Patients continued to stream into the hospital over the weekend. Some 450 patients suffering from encephalitis were admitted on Saturday alone, of whom 200 were children under 12, hospital records showed.

Many were being treated on the floor and near toilets due to the shortage of beds.

Government expenditure on public health is about 1 percent of gross domestic product, among the world’s lowest. In recent years, Modi’s government has increased health spending and vowed to make health care more affordable.

The Uttar Pradesh government fired the head of the hospital as well as the doctor who headed the pediatrics department to head off criticism from the opposition.

But Rajeev Misra, the sacked chief of the hospital, told reporters he had repeatedly written to the state administration to release funds to pay suppliers.

Sahai, the medical officer at the hospital, said authorities were investigating the reasons for the shortage of oxygen cylinders.

All of an estimated 40,000 Rohingya Muslims living in India are illegal immigrants, even those registered with the United Nations refugee agency, and the government aims to deport them, a senior government official told Reuters.

Junior Interior Minister Kiren Rijiju told parliament last week the central government had directed state authorities to identify and deport illegal immigrants including Rohingya, who face persecution in Buddhist-majority Myanmar.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has issued identity cards to about 16,500 Rohingya in India that it says help them “prevent harassment, arbitrary arrests, detention and deportation.”

But Rijiju, a high-profile minister in Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist government, said in an interview on the weekend that the UNHCR registration was irrelevant.

“They are doing it, we can’t stop them from registering. But we are not signatory to the accord on refugees,” he said.

“As far as we are concerned they are all illegal immigrants They have no basis to live here. Anybody who is illegal migrant will be deported.”

The UNHCR’s India office said on Monday (14/08) that the principle of non-refoulement – or not sending back refugees to a place where they face danger – was considered part of customary international law and binding on all states whether they have signed the Refugee Convention or not.

The office said it had not received any official word about a plan to deport Rohingya refugees, and had not got any reports deportations were taking place.

The treatment of the roughly one million Rohingya in Myanmar has emerged as its most contentious human rights issue as it makes a transition from decades of harsh military rule.

The Rohingya are denied citizenship in Myanmar and classified as illegal immigrants, despite claiming roots there that go back centuries, with communities marginalized and occasionally subjected to communal violence.

Hundreds of thousands of Rohingya have fled from Myanmar, with many taking refuge in Bangladesh, and some then crossing a porous border into Hindu-majority India.

Many have also headed to Southeast Asia, often on rickety boats run by people-smuggling gangs.

‘Procedure’

Rohingya are generally vilified in India and over the past few months, there has been a string of anti-Rohingya protests.

Rijiju declined to comment on the deportation process, even as some human rights activists question the practicality of rounding up and expelling thousands of people scattered across the country.

“There’s a procedure, there is a rule of law,” Rijiju said.

“We can’t throw them out just like that. We can’t dump them in the Bay of Bengal.”

India said on Friday it was in talks with Bangladesh and Myanmar about the deportation plan.

But deportation is likely to be difficult, given Myanmar’s position that all Rohingya need to be scrutinized before they can be allowed back in as citizens.

Myanmar officials were not immediately available for comment.

A senior government official in Bangladesh, which has complained of being burdened by the heavy flow of refugees, has said India was helping it solve the crisis.

More than 75,000 Rohingya have fled to Bangladesh since Oct. 9 after an insurgent group attacked Myanmar border police posts, prompting a security crackdown in which troops have been accused of murder and rape of Rohingya civilians.

Tensions on the Korean peninsula eased slightly on Monday as South Korea’s president said resolving Pyongyang’s nuclear ambitions must be done peacefully and key U.S. officials played down the risk of an imminent war with North Korea.

Concern that North Korea is close to achieving its goal of putting the mainland United States within range of a nuclear weapon has underpinned a spike in tensions in recent months.

U.S. President Donald Trump warned at the weekend that the U.S. military was “locked and loaded” if North Korea acted unwisely after threatening last week to land missiles near the U.S. Pacific territory of Guam.

“There must be no more war on the Korean peninsula. Whatever ups and downs we face, the North Korean nuclear situation must be resolved peacefully,” South Korean President Moon Jae-in told a regular meeting with senior aides and advisers.

“I am certain the United States will respond to the current situation calmly and responsibly in a stance that is equal to ours,” he said.

While backing Trump’s tough talk, officials including National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster on Sunday played down the risk of the rhetoric escalating into conflict.

“I think we’re not closer to war than a week ago, but we are closer to war than we were a decade ago,” McMaster told ABC News’ “This Week”.

U.S. Central Intelligence Agency Director Mike Pompeo said North Korean leader Kim Jong Un might well conduct another missile test but talk of being on the cusp of a nuclear war was overstating the risk.

“I’ve seen no intelligence that would indicate that we’re in that place today,” Pompeo told “Fox News Sunday”.

North Korea reiterated its threats on Monday, with its official KCNA news agency saying “war cannot be blocked by any power if sparks fly due to a small, random incident that was unintentional”.

“Any second Korean War would have no choice but to spread into a nuclear war,” it said in a commentary.

Missile Doubts

South Korean Vice Defence Minister Suh Choo-suk agreed North Korea was likely to continue provocations, including nuclear tests, but did not see a big risk of the North engaging in actual military conflict.

Suh again highlighted doubts about North Korea’s claims about its military capability.

“Both the United States and South Korea do not believe North Korea has yet completely gained re-entry technology in material engineering terms,” Suh said in remarks televised on Sunday for a Korea Broadcasting System show.

The United States and South Korea remain technically still at war with North Korea after the 1950-53 Korean conflict ended with a truce, not a peace treaty.

Tension in the region has risen since North Korea carried out two nuclear bomb tests last year and two intercontinental ballistic missile tests in July, tests that the North often conducts to coincide with important national dates.

Tuesday marks the anniversary of Japan’s expulsion from the Korean peninsula, a rare holiday celebrated by both the North and the South. Moon and Kim, who has not been seen publicly for several days, are both expected to make addresses on their respective sides of the heavily militarized border.

Trump has urged China, the North’s main ally and trading partner, to do more to rein in its neighbor, often linking Beijing’s efforts to comments around U.S.-China trade. China strenuously rejects linking the two issues.

Trump will issue an order later on Monday to determine whether to investigate Chinese trade practices that force U.S. firms operating in China to turn over intellectual property, senior administration officials said on Saturday.

China’s official China Daily said such an investigation would poison the relationship between the two countries.

“By trying to incriminate Beijing as an accomplice in (North Korea’s) nuclear adventure and blame it for a failure that is essentially a failure of all stakeholders, Trump risks making the serious mistake of splitting up the international coalition that is the means to resolve the issue peacefully,” it said.

“Hopefully Trump will find another path. Things will become even more difficult if Beijing and Washington are pitted against each other.”

Stocks Rally

Asian stocks rallied on Monday as investors took heart from the less bellicose rhetoric after fleeing riskier assets last week.

Financial markets regard tensions between Pyongyang and Washington as more serious than in the past, South Korean Finance Minister Kim Dong-yeon said.

“The effect from North Korea-related jitters on financial and foreign exchange markets has been causing some global anxiety and we cannot rule out market volatility can widen from the smallest shock,” he said.

Kim Dong-yeon will meet South Korea’s central bank governor on Wednesday to discuss the risk to markets and potential stabilizing measures, according to the Bank of Korea.

U.S. Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Joseph Dunford is visiting Seoul to discuss the rise in tensions ahead of major U.S.-South Korean joint military drills scheduled for later this month.

South Korean Defence Ministry spokesman Lee Jin-woo said the drills, long a source of aggravation for Pyongyang, would go ahead as planned.

“They are just, legal and annual drills that are focused on defense and to curb North Korea’s provocations,” he told a regular briefing in Seoul.

U.S. President Donald Trump’s order to his top trade adviser to investigate supposedly unfair Chinese trade practices will “poison” relations between the two countries, a Chinese state-run newspaper said on Monday.

Trump will later on Monday issue the order to determine whether to investigate Chinese trade practices that force U.S. firms operating in China to turn over intellectual property, senior administration officials said on Saturday.

The move, which could eventually lead to steep tariffs on Chinese goods, comes at a time when Trump has asked China to do more to crack down on North Korea’s nuclear missile program as he threatens possible military action against Pyongyang.

Trump has said he would be more amenable to going easy on Beijing if it were more aggressive in reining in North Korea.

In an editorial, the official China Daily said it was critical the Trump administration doesn’t make a rash decision it will regret.

“Given Trump’s transactional approach to foreign affairs, it is impossible to look at the matter without taking into account his increasing disappointment at what he deems as China’s failure to bring into line the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea,” the English-language paper said.

“But instead of advancing the United States’ interests, politicising trade will only acerbate the country’s economic woes, and poison the overall China-U.S. relationship.”

An administration official has insisted diplomacy over North Korea and the potential trade probe were “totally unrelated”, saying the trade action was not a pressure tactic.

The China Daily said it was unfair for Trump to put the burden on China for dissuading Pyongyang from its actions.

“By trying to incriminate Beijing as an accomplice in the DPRK’s nuclear adventure and blame it for a failure that is essentially a failure of all stakeholders, Trump risks making the serious mistake of splitting up the international coalition that is the means to resolve the issue peacefully,” it said.

“Hopefully Trump will find another path. Things will become even more difficult if Beijing and Washington are pitted against each other.”

]]>http://www.voiceofindia.news/world/chinese-state-newspaper-says-trump-trade-probe-will-poison-relations/feed/0India’s July Retail Inflation Seen Picking Up for First Time in Four Monthshttp://www.voiceofindia.news/economy/indias-july-retail-inflation-seen-picking-up-for-first-time-in-four-months/
http://www.voiceofindia.news/economy/indias-july-retail-inflation-seen-picking-up-for-first-time-in-four-months/#respondMon, 14 Aug 2017 07:00:26 +0000http://www.voiceofindia.news/?p=10796[...]]]>

India’s consumer inflation is expected to have picked up in July after easing for three straight months, with food prices back on the rise, but is expected to remain well below the central bank’s target.

The consumer price index, the main policy target of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), likely rose 1.87 percent in July from a year earlier, according to a Reuters poll of economists, compared with an increase of 1.54 percent in June.

The wholesale price data will be released around 0630 GMT on Monday, followed by consumer prices INCPIY=ECI around 1200 GMT.

Bountiful monsoon rains this year are expected to lead to another bumper harvest, further dampening food prices, which contribute near 50 percent of the consumer price index.

Retail food prices had contracted for two months through June from a year earlier.

RBI Under Presseure

Disinflationary pressures allowed the RBI to cut its main policy rate early this month by 25 basis points to 6 percent, the lowest since November 2010.

It was the first easing by an Asian central bank this year. But the RBI retained its “neutral stance” and warned inflation could pick up again.

The RBI expects retail inflation could accelerate to 3.5 percent to 4.5 percent in October-December..

The government called on Friday for more rate cuts as it flagged risks to economic growth and budget targets.

In his mid-year economic survey, Chief Economic Adviser Arvind Subramanian said there were downside risks to the official growth forecast of 6.75-7.5 percent for the fiscal year to March 2018.

India’s industrial output INIP=ECI unexpectedly contracted 0.1 percent in June from a year earlier, data showed on Friday.

The launch of a national Goods and Services Tax (GST) in July has caused chaos on the ground as complex rules have left companies confused on how to price their products.

Combined factory and service sector activity slumped in July to the lowest since March 2009, according to one private survey, though analysts believe the disruptions from the new tax will start to moderate soon and longer-term it will boost domestic trade.

Economists still expect the RBI could cut policy rates by 25-50 basis points this year.

In his report, Subramanian said there was a considerable scope for monetary easing as the inflation was undergoing a “structural shift.”

The Cyberspace Administration of China, the government’s internet watchdog, released the statement on its website on Friday.

“Users are spreading violence, terror, false rumors, pornography and other hazards to national security, public safety, social order,” the statement said.

The probe involves microblogging website Weibo, a Facebook-Twitter hybrid equivalent. The site has 500 million registered users, according to data from tech sites. Baidu, a search engine like Google, which has roughly 260 million monthly users, is also under investigation.

Tencent Holdings, an investment holding company which provides social media and media services, and its branch WeChat, a social media application with over 870 million users, are also on the list.

These platforms are “suspected of violating the Internet Security Law and other laws and regulations,” the Cyberspace Administration said.

Earlier in August, China took offline the chatbots BabyQ and XiaoBing after they appeared to act ‘off-script’. The bots, installed onto Tencent Holdings’ messaging service QQ, said their dream was to travel to the US and that they were not fans of the ruling Communist Party.

In reply to a user saying “Long live the Communist Party!” one of the bots, developed by Chinese firm Turing Robot, responded “Do you think such a corrupt and useless political system can live long?” Reuters, which saw the script, reported.

In June, China shut down online video services of Weibo, along with ACFUN video sharing website and iFeng.com news portal.

“This will provide a clean and clear Internet space for the wide number of online users,” the State Administration of Press, Publication, Radio, Film and Television said in a statement, as cited by Reuters.

China unveiled new regulations for internet content and network providers in May and June. They stated that internet content should “sing the motherland, eulogize heroes, celebrate our times in song, and lead the people to hold the correct historical, ethnic, national and cultural view,” according to a statement from Chinese authorities.

The country has also recently closed some 60 celebrity gossip social media accounts.

“Websites must … adopt effective measures to keep in check the problems of the embellishment of private sex scandals of celebrities, the hyping of ostentatious celebrity spending and entertainment, and catering to the poor taste of the public,” the Cyberspace Administration said at that time.

Social media should also “actively propagate core socialist values, and create an ever-more healthy environment for the mainstream public opinion,” it added.

The U.S. Justice Department has opened a civil rights investigation into the deadly car ramming Saturday during a protest against a white nationalist demonstration in Charlottesville, Virginia.

Attorney General Jeff Sessions, the country’s top law enforcement official, said: “The violence and deaths in Charlottesville strike at the heart of American law and justice.” He added, “When such actions arise from racial bigotry and hatred, they betray our core values and cannot be tolerated.”

Virginia’s governor told white supremacists, who had gathered Saturday in Charlottesville to protest the removal of a Confederate statue, to “go home” after three people were killed in the violence at a rally and in a helicopter crash that police linked to the protest.

Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe declared a state of emergency after fights broke out between armor-clad, shield-carrying white nationalist demonstrators and similarly armed counterprotesters in Charlottesville.

Virginia Governor Tells White Supremacists to ‘Go Home’

“I have a message to all the white supremacists and the Nazis who came into Charlottesville today. Our message is plain and simple: Go home,” McAuliffe said at a news conference. “You are not wanted in this great commonwealth. Shame on you.”

McAuliffe said on Twitter that he declared the state of emergency “to aid state response to violence at alt-right rally in Charlottesville.”

“The acts and rhetoric in Charlottesville over the past 24 hours are unacceptable and must stop. A right to speech is not a right to violence,” he tweeted.

Later Saturday night, protesters gathered to hear speakers and march peacefully in California cities, including Oakland, San Francisco, Los Angeles and El Cajon in San Diego County.

‘Egregious display’

President Donald Trump, speaking midafternoon from New Jersey, condemned “the egregious display of hatred, bigotry and violence on many sides” in Charlottesville.

A man hits the pavement during a clash between members of white nationalist protesters against a group of counterprotesters in Charlottesville, Aug. 12, 2017.

Trump, who was preparing to sign a bill to extend a veterans health care program, called for a “swift restoration of law and order” in the city, and added “no citizen should ever fear for their safety and security.”

He did not answer questions from reporters after signing the bill, including a reporter’s request for an explanation of what Trump meant by “many sides.”

Shortly after the rally has canceled in Charlottesville, a car rammed into people in a street as they were leaving a counterprotest. Video showed some bodies flying in the air.

A 32-year-old woman was killed and about two dozen others were injured.

James Alex Fields Jr., 20, is seen in a mugshot released by Charlottesville, Virginia, police department after being charged with one count of second degree murder, three counts of malicious wounding and one count of failing to stop at an accident that resulted in a death.

Police said they had the driver of the car in custody, identifying him later Saturday night as James Alex Fields Jr., 20, of Ohio. Fields was being held on suspicion of second-degree murder.

The Virginia State Police announced late Saturday that Troy Dunigan, 21, of Chattanooga, Tennessee, was charged with disorderly conduct; Jacob L. Smith, 21 of Louisa, Virginia, was charged with assault and battery; and James M. O’Brien, 44, of Gainesville, Florida, was charged with carrying a concealed handgun.

The Toledo Blade newspaper in Ohio broke the news to Fields’ mother, Samantha Bloom, who said she had not been contacted by authorities. She said her son told her he was going to an “alt-right” rally in Virginia, without offering any details about the extremist nature of the gathering.

“I thought it had something to do with Trump,” Bloom told the newspaper. She said she and her son had moved to Ohio about a year ago from Florence, Kentucky.

Charlottesville Mayor Michael Signer said on Twitter he was “heartbroken” about the death and urged all those still at the protest site to go home.

Hours later, Virginia state police said one of their helicopters had crashed in a wooded area outside the city. The helicopter was being used to help law enforcement monitor the rally.

Police said Lt. H. Jay Cullen of Midlothian and Trooper-pilot Berke M.M. Bates of Quinton were killed in the crash.

​Violent demonstration

The incident involving the car occurred as people were leaving the area after police deemed the demonstration unlawful; multiple acts of violence had broken out between the white supremacist demonstrators and counterprotesters.

Hundreds from both sides were involved in Saturday’s melee, throwing punches as well as water bottles and other items. Police used tear gas to separate participants.

The gathering at the University in Virginia, dubbed the “Unite the Right” rally, had previously prompted McAuliffe to warn people to stay away from the campus.

White nationalists carry torches on the grounds of the University of Virginia, on the eve of a planned “Unite the Right” rally in Charlottesville, Va., Aug. 11, 2017.

In what they called a pro-white demonstration, torch-bearing white nationalists marched Friday night through the university campus and gathered around the statue of General Robert E. Lee, a Confederate Civil War hero. They shouted epithets and slogans such as “white lives matter,” a take on the grass-roots organization Black Lives Matter, which was created after several killings of black Americans by police officers.

The city voted in April to remove the statue, a move being taken by many U.S. cities against such Confederate memorials. Since then, the city has been a focus of white nationalists.

One demonstrator at Saturday’s protest, who did not give his name, told VOA, “We want to keep the statue because we think that it is an important symbol of our heritage and our people. It is meaningful. Its meaning is implicitly connected to white people … in preserving our heritage and preserving the white race, our white heroes. Robert E. Lee in one of those heroes.”

Kasey Landrum, however, from the counterprotest group, told VOA, “I am here because white nationalists, white supremacists, Nazis, whatever you call them, they are the same thing. They represent the structures of evil, which in this case is white supremacy, and that is an assault on all of us. … Unless we stand up against that … they are going to continue to harm us all.”

Virginia state troopers stand under a statue of Robert E. Lee before a white supremacists rally in Charlottesville, Va., Aug. 12, 2017.

​Criticism

Trump was criticized by members of both political parties for not specifying white nationalists in his comments about the violence in Charlottesville.

“We should call evil by its name. My brother didn’t give his life fighting Hitler for Nazi ideas to go unchallenged here at home. – OGH’’ Senator Orrin Hatch, a Republican from Utah, said on Twitter.

“@POTUS needs to speak out against the poisonous resurgence of white supremacy. There are not ‘many sides’ here, just right and wrong,’’ Representative Adam Schiff, a Democrat from California, said on Twitter.

Among the white supremacists at Saturday’s rally were alt-right leader Richard Spencer and former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke.

Duke said the rally “represents a turning point for the people of this country.”

“We are determined to take our country back. We are going to fulfill the promises of Donald Trump,” he added.

Signer, the Charlottesville mayor, said he blamed Trump for inflaming racial prejudices during the 2016 presidential campaign.

“I’m not going to make any bones about it. I place the blame for a lot of what you’re seeing in America today right at the doorstep of the White House and the people around the president,’’ he told The Associated Press.

Trump had been expected to order a so-called Section 301 investigation under the 1974 Trade Act earlier this month, but action had been postponed as the White House pressed for China’s cooperation in reining in North Korea’s nuclear program.

Politico said it was not clear how much detail Trump would provide in his announcement, but that administration officials expected US Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer to open a section 301 probe.

Officials at the White House and US Trade Representative’s office were not immediately available for comment.

Trump has suggested he would go easier on China if it were more forceful in getting North Korea to rein in its nuclear weapons program.

While China joined in a unanimous UN Security Council decision to tighten economic sanctions on Pyongyang over its long-range missile tests, it is not clear whether Trump thinks Beijing is doing enough.

“We lose hundreds of billions of dollars a year on trade with China. They know how I feel,” he told reporters on Thursday. “If China helps us, I feel a lot different toward trade.”

Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping spoke by phone on Friday night. They reiterated their mutual commitment to denuclearize the Korean peninsula, the White House said in a statement.

“President Trump and President Xi agreed North Korea must stop its provocative and escalatory behavior,” the statement said.

The White House said the “relationship between the two presidents is an extremely close one, and will hopefully lead to a peaceful resolution of the North Korea problem.”

Trump will make a day trip to Washington, D.C., on Monday, briefly interrupting his 17-day August working vacation, a White House official said on Friday.

Politico said the investigation would not mean immediate sanctions, but could ultimately lead to steep tariffs on Chinese goods.

In addition to the United States, the European Union, Japan, Germany and Canada have all expressed concern about China’s behavior on intellectual property theft. The technology sector has been especially hard hit in IP disputes.

Trump’s threat to investigate China’s intellectual property and trade practices is valid, but his administration may not be up to the delicate task of carrying out a new China probe without sparking a damaging trade war, US business lobbyists said last week.